For many years, beauticians and nurses have struggled with the problem of shampooing a persons hair that is confined to a wheelchair. The real problem is maneuvering and positioning that individual close enough to the shampoo bowl in order that his or her head can extend into the open bowl area while at the same time the individual is confined within the wheelchair.
Typically shampoo bowls are mounted within a cabinet structure or sometimes they are simply integrally constructed with a shampoo lounge chair. The problem, again, is maneuvering the wheelchair to where the individual therein can extend his or her neck over the scoop area generally formed on the side of a conventional shampoo bowl. It is often very difficult to accomplish this because of the presence of the wheels of the wheelchair. In some wheelchair designs, the rear wheels reject 12 inches or more from the back side of the wheelchair itself. Consequently, it is impossible to back the wheelchair up to a shampoo bowl in such a position.
Consequently, in most cases, the beautician or nurse will have to seek assistance to remove the person from the wheelchair and then reseat the person in a conventional chair for shampooing. Obviously, this can be time consuming, troublesome, and can be very discomforting to the individual confined within the wheelchair.
Therefore, there has been and continues to be a need for a shampoo bowl that is designed to meet the needs of handicapped individuals, especially individuals confined to a wheelchair.